Monday, October 22, 2007

* Les Miles is an idiot. If you saw the game - not read about it after the fact - his call that resulted in the game-winning LSU TD with :01 second left was one of the worst I've ever seen. If that idiotically risky play - don't confuse the call with boldness, it was pure stupid - doesn't work and the clock runs out - with LSU still having one timeout left - and Miles's team doesn't even get a chance to try a game-winning FG, they'd (rightfully) be calling for his head in Baton Rouge.

Even worse was his "explanation" of the play afterwards. As Mark May said on GameDay Final (and I agree), "He (Miles) totally lost his mind."

Just because LSU made it, doesn't mean it was the right thing to do. And coming on the heals of the 4 consecutive runs right into the line in last weekend's loss to UK, it does raise valid judgement questions.

* Ohio State. First off, I'm still surprised by U-M fans I know who were hoping they'd lose yesterday. I want OSU to win each game...until November 17th. That's the way it should be. What a storyline: OSU playing for a BCS title birth and Michigan playing for the Rose Bowl after rebounding from one of the worst starts in school history. It's storybook.

In terms of yesterday's game, OSU's defense is explosive. And while those hiccups made the game look closer, did anybody really think MSU's O was going to score? (Although, if the MSU player hadn't tried to pick that third consecutive Buckeye turnover up and run, who knows what might have happened from a pure nerves standpoint)

* The SEC. Gosh DAMN is that a brutal, brutal conference. No other is even close. Look at the gauntlet those teams mush run each weekend. There are no breathers. While I have no great love of the SEC, they really are the big losers in the current BCS format. Would OSU (or any other team) go undefeated in that league? Doubtful.

* Notre Dame. Unless those "lucky" unis they wore against USC can block, tackle and score touchdowns (while also bringing 21 year old Joe Montana and some of his alum friends back from the past to play), why the fuck did Charlie have his team wear them? Seriously. Is it just me or does it seem like the Irish have lost about the last 10 times they've worn those things? It was almost embarrassing to see them run onto the field wearing those. Pathetic. They looked more like Halloween costumes than something that would actually inspire. Good god, that team sucks ass. Whew. What stench.

* UCLA. They lose to ND then beat Cal? WTF?!

* South Florida. As the second ranked team in the country, they lost by 3 points on the road to a tough Rutgers team. How much you want to bet they're going to drop waaaaay more in the polls than USC did a couple weeks ago when they lost at home to 41 point 'dog Stanford?

UPDATE: Since I wrote this, the USA TODAY Coaches Poll came out and USF dropped 10 spots.

* Nebraska. Speaking of sucking...wow! This team has gone completely in the toilet following a third consecutive blowout loss, this one to Texas A&M. I use teams, schools and coaches like this as an example to all the Lloyd bashers: we so could have quit after the worst of the worst adversity at the start of the season. But the team and coaching staff didn't...unlike some teams/coaches in Lincoln. What Michigan is accomplishing this year after how the season started is very impressive. But back to the main topic of this bullet point: My god, does Nebraska suck.

* South Carolina's loss to Vandy. Is it just me, or does anybody else never tire of seeing Steve Spurrier lose?

*'Bama crushes Tennessee. This the Vols' third ass whuppin' this season. And with games against South Carolina, Arkansas, UK and a suddenly dangerous Vandy, it could get much worse in Knoxville. Is Phil Fulmer's job in jeopardy?

* Oklahoma. They should drop in the polls after barely surviving against ass-awful ISU. But with the topsy turvy season that is 2007, I think they're going to get a "credit" just for simply winning.

* Notre Dame. I mean they really, really, really suck. They only had about 160 yards of total offense.

* Texas Tech. After getting blown out by Mizzou, good to see them get exposed right on schedule, just as they always do this time of year.

* College Football in General. Suck it, NFL. You got nothing on the game played on Saturday.

Why do you think Les Miles' call was so bad? As of the snap, there were 8 seconds left on the clock. A pass play shouldn't take more than 6 seconds. A completion means you win, and an incomplete pass stops the clock with 2 seconds left to line up and kick a field goal. He doesn't even have to use his last timeout. Seems like the right call to me. The only reason I can think of not to call that play is that you're worried about an interception - to which I say, play to win, not to aviod losing.

Let's take it easy on Miles, even though yes that was an idiotic call. He's our next coach, after all.

Did anyone catch the incredible Gameday recap of the Notre Dame/SC game? They started with a clip of Digger Phelps addressing the crowd at the ND pep rally the night before. He said, "My name is Digger. I'm the undertaker's son. BUT WE AIN'T DEAD YET!" Then they showed USC first touchdown, then replayed Digger screaming "WE AIN'T DEAD YET!" Then the second USC TD..."WE AIN'T DEAD YET!" They did this for every USC score. It was so humiliating that the normally straight-faced mark May was laughing hysterically off camera. Great stuff.

The difference between the Bruins of this weekend and the team that lost to Utah and Notre Dame is the quarterback; against ND they were playing a walk-on due to injuries, and for the Utah game, the moronic Dorrell was playing starter Ben Olson (who is awful) until his injury allowed Cowan to take over.

I believe that Notre Dame has not won in the green uniforms since 1992.

I was watching LSU-Auburn, and actually sort of rooting for Auburn to upset (why not, it's what all the kids are wearing this season), and I didn't think the call was that stupid. Their kicker suffers from Gingellitis, so why not try for 7 first and use that as a last resort?

last time i looked, all of the sec teams had at least one loss - who's to say that they are all great and that their schedule is akin to running a gauntlet? how do we know that they aren't all just average to good? can't tell by their OOC's games - none of them will play anybody, especially on the road, and ESPECIALLY on the road out of the south.

LSU played va tech at home - va tech is 6-1 but lost to the only decent team they played

Florida played nobody

Kentucky played a mediocre Louisville team at home

South Carolina's played nobody

Georgia beat a mediocre Oklahoma St at home

Tennessee ventured out of the south and lost to Cal

Alabama played at a crappy FSU and lost

Auburn hosted S. Florida (lost) and a crappy Kansas State team (won)

Arkansas played nobody

That's it - the ooc schedule of ALL of the big dogs in the SEC was a joke with only one team going on the road out of the south against a decent team(which they lost)

so i ask, how can anyone say that these guys are just amazing and have to suffer by playing one another week in and week out? a conference full of all mediocre teams would also see the same type of dogfights each week too wouldn't it?

I agree on Miles. Why are we rushing to annoint him the next coach? He's a hair's breath from three straight losses...all on questionable, risky calls. A good coach knows when to take a caculated risk...he doesn't just take them *all* and hope for the best.

I know he's a Michigan man, but hasn't this been our mistake in the past...rushing to tap the next Michigan man in line? Inbreeding will dilute even the best gene pools.

This is the main reason I hate the BCS. The Strength of schedule is just a fancy way of making sure that the big schools keep their share of the pie. They can sugar coat it any way they want but that's the reality.

As for ND...it's about time. After years of piling it on against the service academies, karma is a bitch.

In theory, I thought Les Miles was doing the absolute right thing. Take a shot in the end zone (and it HAS to be in the end zone) and if you don't get it, the pass falls incomplete and you set up for the game winning FG while time expires. His team probably should have executed a little better so as to not use as much time as they did, but I don't see the problem with his call. Yes, he did put his team in a position to pull the same idiotic stunt that Cal pulled last week, but you have to faith in your QB to put the ball in the end zone and either have it caught for the winning score or fall incomplete and try a FG.

Srudoff - you are a tool. Just kidding- I usually enjoy a lot of your posts, so I say this with construction criticism in mind: tOSU lost the offensive franchise last year to graduation/draft and you think you'd get any other result than your game against the only SEC team you played last year if you played an SEC schedule this year? OK, so you probably get by Vandy, Ole Miss, and Miss St with ease. Even so, you guys have only faced 2 teams of even the caliber of those 3 SEC teams I mentioned, and you didn't exactly lay the wood to a team you should have slaughtered on Saturday. Now that my dream sequence of the Cocks in the MNC game is over, here's to hoping we see you in a bowl game.

Just so you know, I've deleted your last comment. Even though "pro Michigan," it went a tad too far, don't you think? I think if you reread, even you'd have to agree. Whet's comments, while pro-OSU, are exactly the sort of good natured ribbing I love about college football and here on this blog.

Yost,i watched the LSU finish. itdidn't seem to me to be that much a risk. i thought LSU got a Sparty Bob run on the clock after the TD. the operator could have easily stopped the clock w/ 3 or 4 secs left, but it ran down to 1 anyway. my guess is that if the receiver had dropped it, the clock would have stopped @ 2 or 3 seconds to go. and i'll bet Miles knew that. i'm not saying, i'm just saying, you know?

as for tosu losing? if you live in ohio, it's hard not to cheer for it. they are so one dimensional as a group, and so completely insecure, they really grate on you after 10 or 20 years. despite that, i don't cheer for them to lose, but if it happens? i don't lose any sleep either.

btw- how can you take anyone seriously that would suggest the SEC ain't so great, and inversely try to suggest tosu a comprable schedule? you'd think one humilation in the bcs would be enough. but there's a lot of this self delusion in columbus these days. 60 days ago they were wringing their hands about rebuilding and now they're busy trying to prop up their own cognitive dissonance on being #1.

"as for tosu losing? if you live in ohio, it's hard not to cheer for it. they are so one dimensional as a group, and so completely insecure, they really grate on you after 10 or 20 years. despite that, i don't cheer for them to lose, but if it happens? i don't lose any sleep either."

I think that may be the definition of "cognitive dissonance."

For the record, I've never lived in Ohio, but I did stay in a Holiday Inn once.

Wetbuck,it only counts if it's a Holiday Inn EXPRESS. staying in a plain ole holiday inn (even the vaunted "holidome") doesn't make you any smarter. neither does living in columbus.

which leads to a quasi-personal question- is "whetstone" a reference to whestone park, which is near campus? or do you just like sharpening knives? i always assumed the former, but if you've never lived in ohio, it gave me pause to wonder (it also made me question wonder why'd you be a tosu fans when there are so many other choices that didn't involve praying to satan or pawning your soul but then feared asking that would lead to some long winded story about ancestors from ohio and the passing down of defective genes, so i didn't ask that....).

And App State loses to Georgia Southern, 6-time National Champion powerhouse of 1-AA. They were completely dominated the entire game, our guys just started easing up toward the end and they tried to make a comeback. We beat 'em at their house and snapped their 30 game home winning streak dating back to 02.

Just thought it would make you happier to hear about their misery.

PS...Also, by the transitive property this means we beat Michigan....jk

#1 - I should have qualified the Holiday Inn as an "Express." My mistake.

#2 - I do like sharp knives (in fact my eyes get a far-away look and I drool when gazing upon a razor-sharp blade, but I digress), but that is not the reference. Neither is this "Whetstone Park" you speak of.

"(it also made me question wonder why'd you be a tosu fans when there are so many other choices that didn't involve praying to satan or pawning your soul but then feared asking that would lead to some long winded story about ancestors from ohio and the passing down of defective genes, so i didn't ask that....)."

#3 - The praying to Satan, etc. link with OSU fandom was one of the funniest things I've read here in a long time. I'm glad I hadn't taken a drink of banana smoothie. It has a tendency to freeze one's nose hairs on the way out. Banana flavored nose hairs, while a Michigan staple, are not in demand out west.

#4 - Since you disdain the passing down of genetic defects I can't tell you my story: short or long-winded version.

#5 - Since we are on the topic of genetic abnormalities, didn't you say your wife was an OSU fan? So...how are the young'uns?

for the record, my post about the sec had nothing to do with the buckeyes - it was about the media labeling the sec as great when you don't really know because they won't test their top teams against top competition and almost NEVER on the road out of the south.

the buckeye's schedule this year is weak - but we've played texas home and away the last two years, next two years we play usc home and away, then vtech, then miami, then oklahoma. i think one year of a washington (on the road btw) is ok. i have no idea what would happen if we played the sec - same with michigah. south florida beat auburn, who beat florida, etc, etc, etc.

First off, this is a great blog. I am an OSU alum and fan, and your blog is always a must read for me. I totally agree, as an OSU fan, that we should be rooting for both teams to be as good as possible leading up to The Game. I still don't know what to think about OSU this year. The defense is as good as I've seen, but they can't make mistakes like they did this week in Happy Valley or Ann Arbor. Keep up the great work on the blog, and may the best team win in November.

Sigh.. I guess it was too hard to do a little homework before you typed out that list of conventional misconceptions, huh?

Ohio State beat a below-average Washington team on the road.

Michigan beat an awful ND team at home and got stomped by Oregon and had that other loss I refuse to speak of (also both at home).

Wisconsin beat a bad Wazzou team at home and almost lost to UNLV.

Penn State beat an awful ND team at home.

MSU beat the same awful ND team on the road, and beat a mediocre Pitt team at home.-----------

As far as your SEC assessments, you try to discredit LSU for beating a VT? Or UK for beating preseason Big East favorite Louisville? Laughable.

You also assert that "none of them will play anybody, especially on the road, and ESPECIALLY on the road out of the south", yet you yourself point out that UT played at Cal. You also conveniently forgot to mention that Mississippi State played at West Virginia.

When is the last time a Big Ten team came and played a regular season game in an SEC stadium? I honestly can't remember. I do know that Vanderbilt came up to UM last year.

I can only speak on Georgia's future schedules, but over the next few years we travel to play the likes of Arizona State, Colorado, Louisville, Clemson, and Oregon.

I didn't see the LSU finish, but went online to watch it after everyone called Miles an idiot. 2 things could have resulted on that play that would have made him look like an idiot: a sack, or an interception. He took the sack out of play by having Flynn throw the ball on a quick 5 step drop. They had a receiver in single coverage with no safeties around. But the argument that the clock almost ran out is asinine. The receiver CAUGHT the ball in the endzone with 4 seconds left. If he drops it, they still have 4 seconds to try the field goal. They were not in danger of having time run out.

An interception, obviously makes him look stupid. But it would have taken an unbelievable defensive play to make a pick there, trying to defend on an island.

To me, if you want to talk about idiots, how does Tuberville get a pass?? Well over 3 minutes left, and you have timeouts, and squib kick?????? You give them the ball on the 42 yard line?? How about making them work for it just a little bit.

Tommy is the one that should be getting torched, not Les, and I cannot fathom how anyone could see it any differently.

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